Five-Minute Journalism School

The Hill's Albert Eisele, for reasons I can't quite understand, has published a column today defending his making public immovable pressroom gargoyle Helen Thomas' comment that she'll kill herself if Dick Cheney runs for President.

Says Eisele, "the larger lesson here, and one that I’m surprised Ms. Thomas, who has been a Washington reporter since 1943 and retired as UPI’s White House correspondent in 2000, failed to understand, is that “off the record” is a virtually meaningless term, which is why this column bears the name it does."

In the same column, though, Eisele asks us to pardon his own prehistoric outlook: "Little did I know, being a creature of the typewriter/telegraph era of journalism, that cybergossip Matt Drudge would pounce on the item and transmit it to the farthest regions of the Internet universe."

So, the lesson here is, um, what now? If you publish it your paper, it's all good in the 'hood ... unless that meanie Matt Drudge picks it up and encourages people other than your co-workers (and maybe your mom) to actually read it. Damned Internets.

Seriously, kids -- drop out of "journalism school" today. Real jobs are plentiful.